Battlefield medicine may have a long and bloody history, but it is a powerful driving force in today’s clincial practice

The relationship between the healer and the fighter is a long and complex one.
The battlefield has exposed people to pernicious disease, horrific injury
and death while stretching medical intuition, spurring innovation and
focusing minds on the most pressing areas of research. As Hippocrates, the
Ancient Greek physician and father of modern medicine, observed: “War is the
only proper school for a surgeon”.

The observation holds. A decade of intense combat for British forces, in Iraq
and Afghanistan, has offered incomparable training to doctors based in
battlefield hospitals. Surgical training in the NHS is over-stretched,
exacerbated by European laws limiting